I AM Titanium! So, people, never pooh-pooh the Pop!

‘If it wasn’t for the music I don’t know what I’d do. Last night a DJ saved my life. Last night a DJ saved my life from a broken heart’. The song by Indeep, a New York based group, was popular in the early 80’s. As I danced around my bedroom listening to that song, I never gave thought to the meaning of the lyrics.

Just another pop song, thousands before it, thousands after it. Here today and gone tomorrow. Replaced by the next catchy tune. No lasting impact made in my happy little life as I sang along and danced, although I would still sing along now if I heard it played. But no far-reaching revelations to my inner soul after hearing all those  pop songs with their moving and beautiful lyrics eh?

Moving lyrics? In a pop song? Ha Ha definitely not.

Er…Wrong!

There is always a place for Pop in everyone’s life, and as I grew older it became even more so, with much more depth and meaning connected to it – not something people my age like to admit to very often. I did begin to associate pop songs with certain people, places, emotions and even dreams! But that was only the tiny glimpse of what was to come.

Surely it must take talent to make a successful song? They don’t just happen without some effort and skill. So why does pop get such a bad press?

What is Pop music? A Definition by Bill Lamb, describes it as being pleasurable to listen to, rather than having much artistic depth.  Pop music is generally thought of as a genre which is commercially recorded and desires to have a mass audience appeal. It can include any style.

Not having much artistic depth is certainly the view held by many. To pooh-pooh something means to express contempt for or impatience about; make light of.  So they pooh-pooh away with as little depth as the very thing they condemn pop music for lacking. 

‘What rubbish is in the Hit Parade this week?’ was a very annoying quip made every Thursday night by my father when Top of The Pops came on.  He would then spend the next 25 minutes pooh-poohing the rubbish in the Hit Parade and talking over the songs, mocking Legs & Co and Pans People.

Highly irritating. We told him every week it was The Charts. And shushed him. But it was fruitless trying to quiet an old man who knew nothing about pop music.  (He was probably in his late 30’s at this point!)

But I feel I must stand up for the poor pooh-poohed pop. Why?

Because even though I know Pop music is rarely ever thought of as inspirational, motivating and liberating – it has been to me. And very recently.

At an age when I was well and truly out of touch with the latest trends, fashions, TV shows and generally ‘what’s hot and what’s not’ in the entertainment world, Pop music called to me, reached me and inspired me.

I was 42 and 3/4 years old. A bit old in the tooth to know what was even in the Hit Par…I mean The Charts.  I discovered that my marriage of 20 years was over. I had been discarded. Updated for a newer and better version. Traded in for a shinier gadget 14 years younger.

Being told your husband is having a mid-life crisis is no help at all when you are smacked in the face, your 14 years older face, with utter shock and disbelief that he was doing this to you. He apparently couldn’t believe it either as he steadfastly refused to admit he was leaving me for another woman. Which only added to the insult even further. I knew her and had seen them together many times.

Many emotions followed. Anger, rejection, shock, humiliation, guilt, despair. To name a few. No appetite and a dramatic weight loss to add to the problems. I don’t endorse food avoidance as a healthy way to deal with all those emotions. It only heightens them at a time when they can manage to half kill you all on their own, thanks very much.

I moved back into the ‘marital home’, as solicitors love to call it, (more insult to injury!) still married but alone. My husband left to move to his swanky converted apartment within managed grounds in Nob Hill. Parking his new Chelsea Tractor in his private parking space. I’ve always felt that 4×4’s are such a necessary vehicle in Suburbia. He obviously agreed. At least just on this one tiny point.

Anyway, once back ‘home’ as desperate as I was, I did start to listen to the radio. At first it was necessary just to drown out the sound of me crying and sobbing. And then to break that bloody horrible silence the rest of the time. The only electrical item left was the radio. He had taken every other item that needed electricity except the fridge and the toaster.

I couldn’t bare to listen to the local radio station – HIS radio station with HIS local football teams results. HIS local news, HIS old-fashioned music. HIS. He used to demand silence when it was on so he didn’t miss any update about the football team. Even though he had spent hours the night before checking out ‘new signings and transfers’.

My choices now. Quite a novelty and one of many to come. So I chose a different station with ‘modern’ tunes. And that’s how I discovered the pop song yet again. And so  I began to hum along, then to sing along. Then the words had an artistic depth of meaning I never knew could exist in a pop song. Funny how lyrics mean more when you are at your most vulnerable. When you notice things much more than ever.

Like you have had your cataracts removed and the light is so bright you need sunglasses on a dull day. Have you ever had a new car, only then to notice the same make and model everywhere you go? Or been pregnant, or wanted to be, to then notice that everywhere you go there is a pregnant woman?

Well that’s how it was with the songs. Every song had lyrics that meant something, that expressed how I felt, and what I was thinking. And they were counseling me. Therapy in lyrics. I had that radio turned up loud and I screamed out with the artists, meaning every word they said.

I have a few songs whose lyrics really reached me; 7 songs that in those early months ‘struck a cord’ in me. Made me sing and even dance again, but not in front of anyone else. So in true Top 40 style here is my ‘Top 7’ – in reverse order of course!

No. 7 – Alone Again by Alyssa Reed

No. 6 – It’s Pixie Lott, All About Tonight

No. 5 – Read All About It. Professor Green

No. 4 – Katy Perry’s Part of Me

No. 3 – Kelly Clarkson. Stronger

No.2 – Calvin Harris feat. Rhianna with We Found Love

And the No. 1 song is…

Titanium by David Guetta.

Those lyrics were so true it was as if David Guetta had written them about me and my very horrible and difficult situation at the time.

It inspired me, even though I had been shot down I would not fall. I would get up. Well I guess I would, wouldn’t I?

Because I AM Titanium after all.

So people, never Pooh-pooh the Pop.